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Clean Up the World!
UNDP supports East Timor beach clean up. The Special Representative of the Secretary General in East Timor, Mr. Sergio de Mello and UNDP Representative, Mr. Finn Reske-Nielsen, joined more than 150 people to clean up the spectacular Christo Rei beach on the outskirts of Dili today. The beach and surrounding areas were recently declared protected by the Transitional East Timor Administration. The clean up coincided with a global initiative coordinated in Sydney, which encourages community action to tackle local environment concerns. The initiative, which has been dubbed, Clean Up the World, was launched 12 years ago when a group of concerned citizen living around Sydney Harbor decided to clean up their local environment. Today more than 120 countries and 40 million people disposed waste, collected rubbish and participated in environmental education programmes in their communities. This year, for the first time, East Timor participated. The community of the Christo Rei beach was joined by the UN Development Programme (UNDP), the East Timor Scouts, local environment NGO Haburas and the Transitional Administration’s Environmental Protection Unit, in a beach clean up to raise awareness about the area’s new protected status. “Protecting our Environment is the key to sustaining livelihoods that’s why we are supporting the community to take environmental protection into their own hands,” said UNDP Representative, Mr. Finn Reske-Nielsen. The day started with an opening ceremony, during which the SRSG announced that he intends to appoint a Timorese Government Official in charge of Environmental issues. ‘That person will be in charge of planning and Development. Development must not harm the environment and environmental concerns must be part of development planning”, Mr. De Mello said. It was estimated that 300 bag of rubbish was collected from the beach.
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